


Barely Vogue

by KilltheRhythm



Category: Football RPF
Genre: Comedy, High School AU, M/M, i wrote this over iMessages for a friend so plz do not judge me, oh boy this is way different from how I usually write, some high key emo shit occasionally, sorta crack I guess, wow I still can't write forwards
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-09
Updated: 2016-10-09
Packaged: 2018-08-20 09:06:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8243858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KilltheRhythm/pseuds/KilltheRhythm
Summary: James is perhaps a little more emo than he'd like to admit, but when he tries to make a better impression all hell breaks loose.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Before you judge me and go "omg dude this is poorly written" realize this was written in a series of midnight texts to my friend, who suggested this rather widespread cast of characters.

James looked down at the bottle of hair bleach. He frowned. This wasn't right. He didn't want blonde hair, but he was tired of the comments from his fellow high schoolers. He wasn't emo. He was not emo. But if you like bands like Panic! At The Disco and Blood On The Dancefloor then people started putting labels on you.

So he did what he generally did, and consulted his best friend, Neymar, on how not to be seen as emo. Neymar had had some questionable hair in his past, but no one ever thought of him as emo so clearly he was the man to go to.

"Uh like bleach it or some shit. Why does this even matter?" Neymar said, adjusting his glasses over the skype screen.

James narrowed his eyes. "Everyone thinks I'm emo, and as far as I know, no one likes emos."

Neymar rolled his eyes. "Correction: Cristiano Ronaldo doesn't like emos."

James glared at him with the intensity of a thousand suns. "More people than Cristiano dislike emos. I don't want to be shunned for something that isn't true. I'm going to be a junior this year, here's my chance to shine!"

"Bro, that's so gay. Just admit it's to impress Cristiano."

James's face was even angrier now. "No. No on so many different levels! I'm not gay!"

So against all better belief, he went for it. His hair was blonde. He looked in the bathroom mirror and sighed. Maybe it was just the lighting that made it look bad. His mom gasped when she saw it that night, and James could only hope it was a gasp of pure awe.

So maybe he avoids Neymar for the better part of that week, worrying what the other teen was going to say. He simply had only his best interests in mind.

However, as he entered his house that Friday afternoon, he sees Neymar sitting on his couch smugly, making idle chitchat with his parents.

"Why are you here?" He hissed.

"Because your family loves me?" Neymar smiles. "By the way, your hair is shit."

"It's not emo. I think you're offended that I pull blonde off better than you."

"James, your hair is the gayest thing I've ever seen, and I've watched gay porn. Just admit it."

James was seriously questioning why Neymar was his best friend. "My hair isn't gay. My hair is straight. So straight. As straight as--"

He is shut up by Neymar's hand on his mouth. "Just let it happen man. You have gay hair. End of story."

James spends the next two weeks wondering if his hair is really that gay. He asks a few people, but no one gives him that good of an answer. He tries to push it to the back of his mind, and eventually the insecurity goes away.

That is, until he is paired up with no one other than his school's fashion icon, Cristiano Ronaldo, for a health project. Cristiano is stylish and sleek, and suddenly James feels like his fall out boy t shirt and checkered vans aren't good enough. And maybe his hair wasn't that good either, he thought.

He would ask for hair advice from Cristiano, but he is still in shock about how he is partnered up with the older teen. The odds were against him. He could have been partnered up with one of the Chileans, who both he and Neymar were convinced were all in a cult, or be stuck with Luis Suarez, captain of the wrestling team and known for biting, like how Neymar was.   
But instead, he was gifted with the partnership of Cristiano Ronaldo, the school's very own god. The guy who the three girls in the back of James's precal class screamed about. James was starstruck.

So maybe James spent the better part of that health class staring at Cristiano, but it was only because he was studying his style. Not for romantic reasons. He was straight. That was the reason why he missed the entire lecture and hearing what their project was about.

"Hi, James, right?" Cristiano asks, smiling a million dollar smile. James suddenly remembers that he had braces only a month ago, and had never seen even any evidence of Cristiano ever having them.

"Yeah, and you're Cristiano Ronaldo. Wow." He doesn't mean to say wow, but he ends up anyways. The three Chileans behind him snicker.

"Just call me Cris. It'll be a pleasure to work with you."  
Suddenly James realizes that he doesn't know what the project is about at all.

So he tries to voice this in a way that doesn't make him seem like he is lost in Cristiano's eyes or like he's completely stupid. Unfortunately he fails, and manages to do both. The laughter behind him is only louder.

"Our project is about teenage sexuality."

James is completely certain that the world is against him.

So somehow he finds himself interviewing people in his school about their sexuality. This is about as awkward as it sounds, and James curses to the heavens that his school is progressive and willing to cover these issues.   
He interviews a few girls and things are going quite smoothly until he realizes that his test group holds a wildly disproportionate number of preppy girls, and that this would not please the teacher.

Neymar, only because his favorite hobby is tormenting James, offers to be one of the data points. James isn't thrilled to ask questions about how his best friend figured out his sexual preference and the like.

Neymar is only too happy to share. "You see, I didn't always know I was gay. It's something inside of you, y'know, and you realize is at different points in your life."

James hates that he was going to ask this question. "How did you figure it out?"

Neymar's grin is purely predatory. "Well," he drags out the vowels. James wants to run away. "I was at this party and..."

"Please just cut to the chase."

"I went got really drunk and sucked maybe one or five dicks and yeah, that's when I knew. What about you?"

"I'm not gay."

Somehow Neymar manages to get his insufferable partner for health, Luis Suarez, or as he was better known, Chompy, to be interviewed after him. James wondered if Cristiano's interviews were this horrible.

"So, uh, how did you come to terms with your sexuality?" He asks, trying not to be awkward.

"Didn't have to, I'm straight." Luis looks pleased with himself.

"But like, did you do any thinking about it?"

"I think about tits a lot."

James wants to drink bleach. "Okay, any thought in at all?"

Luis shakes his head. "Nah, always knew I wasn't a faggot. Are you asking me this because you wanna do me? I know a lot of people do."

James definitely is going to drink bleach.

\-----

The last person he interviews is Leo Messi, captain of the soccer team and owner of a questionable high-school beard. He is far easier to talk to Suarez, and does not make James want to commit suicide. This is improvement.

"So, you're basically asking me my thought process about how I decided who I wanted to do?"

James nods.

Leo squints into the distance. "Huh, I didn't do much thinking. I guess I just knew girls were for me? It's not like I have anything against guys, but like, I just don't like them that way."

James wants to cry. He is finally getting somewhere.

Leo decides to continue. "James, are you asking this because you need help figuring out your sexuality? I completely support you being gay, if that's what it is."

"I'm not gay--"

Leo cuts him off dramatically, hand in the air near James. "This is no place for hate! My best friend, Cris, he's bi. Of course you wanting to fuck guys is okay by me!"

James saves that information in his head for later, but there are more pressing issues at hand than discussing Cristiano Ronaldo's sexuality.

"I'M NOT GAY!"

Leo's look is that of pure sympathy. "Even if you need to experiment, I support you."

\-----

James comes back to his partner with tales of horror. Cristiano listens with a look of pure sympathy. Because Cris is not only physically perfect, but has blessed luck, his interviews went a lot smoother than James's.

"Well some polish guys enjoyed telling me how much they appreciated the female form, but I think other than that..." Cris trails off and James just wants to ask why everyone thinks he is gay.

Suddenly Cristiano's face lit up.   
"Wait! I did have two weirdos! This Chilean duo, Alexis Sanchez and Edu whatever his name was. They're fucking crazy, I swear."

James immediately perks up at this. The chance to win a longstanding bet on if the pack of Chileans that went to their school were in a cult is in his grasp.   
"Continue..."

Cris winces. "You don't want me to."

"I really do!"

The taller teen sighs. "You were complaining about being weirded out by the gay stuff. This is gonna do exactly that."

"Cristiano, I had to listen to my best friend talk about blowing guys. This cannot possibly be weirder than that." James says determinedly, because the $50 he had bet was on the line.

Cristano stares at him for a second. "Ok, so Alexis Sanchez and I wanna say, Eduardo Vargas? Dunno, those two short guys, you probably know who they are, they're in your grade. Anyways, they said they like fucked in some Buddhist temple? Like they didn't mention anything else, just talked about doing it in a Buddhist temple. I think I'm scarred."

James deflates slightly. This does not prove his cult theory. He tries not to show it, instead focusing on giving Cristiano a small smile of his own.

"Hey it's okay man, I had a bunch of bad ones."

Ronaldo sighed. "Okay, yeah, but we also only interviewed like six guys. The teacher is gonna kill us."

And thus, as James would later account to Neymar, this is how he and Cristiano end up interviewing each other and it is both more and less uncomfortable than James had imagined. He gets to hear about how Cris liked both girls and guys, and then stutter back at the taller man about himself. Somehow he is written down on the sheet as "questioning".

He goes to bed that night wondering if maybe everyone else's assumptions were right and he was gay, but then snaps out of it and decides to listen to the new Panic! At The Disco album before dozing off.

If getting the project together was awkward and embarrassing, then presenting it was even worse. James has never been one for public speaking, but public speaking about private interests of his classmates is even worse. Leo gives them a cheesy thumbs up the entire time, and somehow it does the opposite of what it is supposed to do to his morale.

Cristiano somehow executes his part effortlessly, exuding charm and grace, even when he talked about students using sexual encounters as a way to figure out more about themselves.

James curses him for this, as it only makes him seem even more awkward as he stuttered through the percentages and other assorted data.

Luckily, the class seemed pretty lax about it all (Neymar cackling at far too many things, and the Chilean duo looking rather horrified throughout a larger chunk of the presentation). James still ends his speech with butterflies in his stomach.

Luckily any embarrassment that he may have caused himself is quickly forgotten when Neymar and Luis start up their presentation on AIDS.

Neymar sees it fit to try and mention his sexuality as many times as possible during the entire presentation, and Luis counters this by being terrifyingly homophobic. The class seems to be enjoying it, and James calms a little, less self conscious about his presentation when he thinks it'll be long forgotten. Neymar is on a particularly loud tangent about how protection was v e r y important, full of unnecessary details, the student body laughing, when the teacher decides to cut him off.

James forgets all about the whole questioning thing after that.

The subject of James's sexuality is only brought up a month or two later, when Neymar and Alexis are talking about being non-straight athletes (well, Alexis is, Neymar is mostly talking about all of the hot guys on the soccer team).

James doesn't even really notice that he has been mentioned at first, just absentmindedly nodding until he hears Neymar say "I'm sure he'd go on a date with him."

James freezes. The pronouns are wrong. He would not go on a date with a guy. He is a straight man.   
"I would not!"

Alexis gives him a strange look. James still thinks he's in a cult. "Really? I'm pretty sure literally anyone at this school would go on a date with Cristiano Ronaldo."

James raises an eyebrow. "I'm going on a date with Cris?"

"Hypothetically."

This is an intriguing thought. The idea of going on a date with his partner for health seems to follow him around wherever he went. And it's not like you could blame him; he wasn't gay, he was just appreciating good looks. Not homo in the slightest.

"You've brought up Ronaldo for like the twentieth time this week." Neymar says through a mouthful of popcorn. He has invited himself over (again) to play FIFA with James to "de-stress" before thanksgiving, and is currently annoyed with his friend's choice of subject matter.

"Not my fault he's stylish and attractive and I'm partnered up with him in health."

Neymar pushes his glasses back up the bridge of his nose. "That's so gay."

"It's not gay, I'm appreciating the aesthetic!" James exclaims, right before Neymar scores on him again.

His friend sets down his controller, turning towards James. His face is deadpan. "That is the gayest thing I've heard. And look, I'm really gay. Really fucking gay. And I can tell when someone has a crush. Which you do."

\----

James spends the entire thanksgiving break trying to distract himself from thinking about his not gay crush. He tries everything, cooking with his mom, watching football, listening to the entire fall out boy discography, but nothing works.

It doesn't help that Neymar is not in town at all, so he's left to find other people in the neighborhood to hang out with. Though he may curse his lack of social skills, he manages to land a game of FIFA with Leo and Luis, but they spend the entire time talking about some girl at school and James's thoughts tend to drift off.

"Seriously Leo, I think I have a chance with her. I'm the captain of the wrestling team, I could get literally any girl I wanted." Luis grins, lounging in one of the beanbag chairs.

Leo's eyes do not leave the TV screen. He does not have the heart to tell Luis how wrong he is. "I think she'd prefer me, y'know, but it's not fair for us to talk about people we're interested in while poor James here doesn't get to say anything about the special someone in his life."

"I'm single." James blurts.

Luis and Leo give him a sympathetic look. "That's sad."

"Any girl you're thinking about though? There's gotta be someone." Luis says, grinning wildly, too much teeth for one smile.

"Uh--" James is cut off by Leo.  
  
"Or guy? We could set you up with someone." Leo smiles sweetly. Luis looks personally offended.

"Ok seriously Leo, I'm not ga--"

Leo shuts him up with another determined look. "It's okay. You just gotta look deep inside yourself and realize that you can't keep hiding from your own sexuality. Acceptance is key, man."

Luis gives Leo the same look he gives him whenever he gets too philosophical. "My next door neighbor is hot. You want me to give you her number?"

"Luis, she's twenty."

"A twenty out of ten."

"Luis, she's actually fucking twenty. And a lady. James is 17."

Luis rolls his eyes. "Alrighty then, Leo. Not interested, James?"

James shakes his head rapidly. Going to Leo's house was a mistake.

"Do you like someone? I won't set you up if that's the case, man." Luis says, the most polite he's been to James in possibly forever.

The Colombian pauses. He wanted them to stop trying to do this. He needed out. James decides to nod.

Both Leo and Luis have similar reactions. "Who are they?"

James comes to a stop. He needs to come up with someone, and fast. "Uhhh, well, tan, pretty, kinda tall, y'know, the basics."

"Does she go to our school?" Luis asks.

"Do I know him?" Leo follows up.

James is at a loss. He's never been good with lying, but this is even worse. He excuses himself and leaves as swiftly as possible.

\-----

"You left?" Neymar splutters over the phone. James winces.

"I didn't know what to do, I panicked! I couldn't follow up with a lie like that, I can't do that."

Neymar's facial expression of extreme displeasure is palpable over the line. "You started describing Cristiano."

"He was the first person to come to mind!"

"That's pretty gay." Neymar quips, grinning. James wonders when that phrase started being so common in Neymar's vocabulary.

"Oh my god, why did I even call you? Are you gonna help me, or what?!" James wails, and Neymar thinks that perhaps he faintly hears a my chemical romance song play in the background.

Only because James is his best friend does Neymar fight the urge to point out that the other teenager is listening to my chemical romance. "Well, a n y w a y s, you fucked up. If you followed up with anyone, Cristiano, Vibe, fuck, anyone, they would have set you up."

The my chemical romance song has definitely gotten louder. "I'm not gay, like none of those guys appeal to me."

Neymar rolls his eyes, even though James can't see it. "Yeah right." A pause. "Actually, good, keep your hands off Vibe, he's mine. Ronaldo, good luck with getting with him."

"I'm not gay"

Neymar rolls his eyes again. "You're listening to my chemical romance."

"And your point is?"

Neymar truly wonders sometimes why he's friends with him.

So, Neymar, being a supportive best friend, decides to consult all of the people he could think of that would be constructive to the cause of Getting James A Date, Preferably With Ronaldo.

This is why he ends up sitting at a booth in Taco Bell with Leo Messi, Olivier Giroud and Cesc Fabregas.

"Why are we here?" Cesc asks, more chipper than usual, completely ruining the intense moment they were having.

"Yeah, why are we? I don't even know who you are." Olivier adds.

Leo decides to step in. "We're here to discuss what we need to do with James."

Olivier raises an eyebrow. "I don't think I even know a James."

"Mate, he's the emo one."

Neymar decides to intervene before it becomes a roast session regarding James's music and fashion tastes. "OKAY! I brought all of you here today because you are the best people I could think of to get James set up with someone."

"But why me? I have literally nothing to do with any of this." Olivier asks, looking directly at Neymar with the intensity of an angry chihuahua.

Once again, Neymar must intervene before the conversation is derailed. "You're like, an accomplished homosexual. Cesc knows literally everyone at our school, Leo likes helping people out, and I'm James's best friend. We're like the avengers or some shit, I dunno."

"The avengers of high school matchmaking?" Leo asks.

"What are we dealing with?" Cesc continues, now interested.

"I told James I'd set him up with someone. Except, I don't know who. At all. All of my friends are taken." Neymar says.

"Does he have a type?"

"Tan, tall and stunning." Leo and Neymar say in unison.

"Mathieu Debuchy?" Olivier offers, thinking of his friend. Neymar winces instantly. Mathieu is not exactly any of those things.

"He's straight. And he'd crush James like a little bug." Leo shakes his head.

"Alexis Sanchez?"

"He's literally only one of those things, and I'm pretty sure he's in whatever is his weird hippie-ass equivalent of a relationship is." Neymar frowns.

Eventually they do decide on someone, the sister of one of Leo's teammates, and James is given an address and a pep talk.   
He comes back to Neymar's house two hours later sporting a giant frown and a tale about how much of a trainwreck the whole thing was.

"She just wasn't that interesting, y'know? There was no romantic connection." James sighs.

"You've said that since seventh grade." Neymar quips, shaking his head.

"She thought I was gay." James pouts.

Neymar is going to have a stroke at this rate. "So does everyone else. Even your mom."

"I don't need your mom jokes right now! I'm having a crisis and I'm going to die alone." James complains, throwing himself on the couch.

"It wasn't a joke! Your mom seriously thinks you're-- never mind. I think you just need to find the right person."

James looks at Neymar with a fantastic air of protest. "I just said there was no right person!"

Neymar sighs and shakes his head. "There's gotta be someone out there who's perfect for you. Like, uh, Cristiano Ronaldo or something."

If looks could kill, Neymar would be thoroughly dead as of now. "He's perfect, but I'm not gay. Not gay. No. Ho. Mo."

"Saying no homo only makes is more gay." Neymar shakes his head.

And only because James is his best friend and Neymar is his confident for all things lgbt, he gets a text at 2:35 am three nights later

The most emo (2:35 AM):  
fuck

Neymar :) (2:37 AM):   
what

The most emo (2:37 AM):  
I think I might like someone

Neymar :) (2:40 AM):   
is it Cristiano

The most emo (2:45 AM):   
....

Neymar :) (2:46 AM):   
it's Cristiano

The most emo (2:49 AM):   
it's not gay if it's Ronaldo. He's just v good looking

Neymar :) (2:52 AM):   
whatever keeps you from crying

\----

"This is an actual problem!" James grumbles over the phone. My Chemical Romance is playing yet again in the background.

It takes copious amounts of self restraint for Neymar not to hang up upon hearing the black parade for what is the third time this week over the phone. "Why is it a problem?"

"He's my partner."

"I don't understand. Do some thinking about it, I don't know. I think I gotta go now." Neymar says, checking his hair in the mirror.

"Why? Since when do you have plans?" James asks, surprised.

"I got someone visiting. Can't have your emo ass talking about Cristiano Ronaldo when I have a hot guy over."

James is even more surprised. "Who the fuck?"

"Vibe. Man bun guy, Danish. Good luck with your homosexual crisis." Neymar adds before hanging up. He checks his appearance one last time. He's determined to look as attractive as possible.

Neymar is the owner of a one track mind. He near instantly forgets that James is freaking out internally when a familiar blonde with a ponytail arrives at his house. He is especially thankful, because not only can he focus on the situation at hand without worrying about James, but his parents are out for the night.

And maybe he accidentally ignores James for an entire week, but he has a one track mind and an interesting person to flirt with, which is better than James's little sexuality crisis. Instead, James is forced to talk to Leo, who is quite possibly more interested in who James likes than the teen's fears that he was gay.

\----

"Okay, okay, I get it, I've been a bad friend." Neymar mumbles to Leo when the other teen comes to chastise him (Suarez in tow, as Luis seemed to be Leo's sidekick and was near always with him).

"Damn straight!" Luis yells, but only because he feels like he needs to contribute something.

"I understand, Neymar." Leo says solemnly, putting a hand on Neymar's shoulders and dipping his head slightly. "We all occasionally ignore our friends in the chase of a hot ass." Luis echoes a "yeah" to this, and Neymar tried very hard not to start hysterically laughing at the spectacle.

"So what did you do, oh Saint Leo?" He asks, looking at the paler teenager.

Judging by the smug look on Leo's face, it wasn't anything good. Or, in Leo's mind it was good, but it most likely had bad consequences. "I set him up on a date with the person I think he likes!"

"And who is he?" Neymar asks. There is no way that Leo could have really set James up with the right person. Leo means well, and he wasn't stupid per say, but he was rather unobservant of the whole romance thing.

"He? It's a guy?" Luis asks, slightly shocked. Leo and Neymar do not bother giving him the time of day.

"Well he said the guy he liked was tan, attractive, kind, single... It could only be one person!"

"Who?"

If Leo's grin got any wider it would fly off of his face. "Alexis Sanchez!"

"WHAT?!"

"I know, I hit the nail right on the head." Leo looks supremely pleased with himself.

"You did the opposite."

"How so? Tall, tan, nice, single, that's Alexis."

Neymar rolls his eyes. He does not understand how wrong someone could be. "Alexis isn't tall. Yes he's taller than you, but he's not tall. Yeah he's tan and nice, but he's also not single. You've failed. Miserably."

Leo looks horribly dejected. Luis pats him on the back and begins to lead him away from Neymar. Right before they leave he gives the Brazilian a particularly hard stare.

\----

James curses to every being to have ever existed, holy or not. Across from him at the table of the Starbucks was Alexis. This was as uncomfortable as it gets.

"So.... Let me just say that Leo got it wrong. I do not like you like this." James says, trying his hardest not to stutter or sound like an asshole.

"I'm taken. I don't even know how Leo talked me into this." Alexis says, stirring his tea.

"He really just wants to get it right, I think. He wants to set me up with the person of my dreams, you know?" James says, feeling some of the tension dissolve now that it was established as not a date.

Alexis smiles and nods knowingly. "Once he hears that someone has a crush he goes into Cupid mode. It's a shame he's shitty at it."

James nods frantically, mouth full of burning coffee that he was too impatient to let cool. "He does this a lot?"

"All the time. He's not the person I'd go to to get set up with the person I like." Alexis says, with a far away look in his eyes.

"Well who is?" James feels like the shorter teenager is leading on to something, possibly someone that would actually be able to help him, since Neymar seemed to be of no use.

"Her methods are unconventional, but she certainly could set you up with anyone." Alexis smiles, scribbling down something on a napkin.

"Did she set you up with your... boyfriend?" James asks, feeling like he's treading on thin ice.

"Oh Edu? No no, I met him on my own. But I've seen this lady work wonders. Whoever you like, she'll set you up."

James leaves the cafe with a napkin tucked firmly in his pocket. Only when he gets home does he get a good look at what's written inside.

HO₽€ $OLO  
(555) 626 3521  
call to make an appointment   
(Yes she really spells her name that way)

James calls the number only to be greeted by a voice that he knows is not Hope's.

"Hello, this is Alex Morgan, what can I do for you?"

James furrowed his brow and checked the number. "Uh, I was told to call here to talk to Hope Solo. And make an appointment, I think?"

Alex's voice remains bright and chipper. "Oh, this is your first time? I'm currently the phone operator for Ms Solo. You're going to have to tell me when you'd be able to make an appointment before you can actually use her services."

"Services? What kind of services?" James asks, suddenly feeling very sketchy.

"Oh my god, you're so ignorant. Services like style advice, getting set up with the your dream date, faking school projects, moving up in the food chain at school. You know, the usual stuff."

"Oh. Yeah, I was told she could help set me up with someone I liked."

The eye roll Alex was giving was near audible. "Ok. Now when would you like to make an appointment? The earliest she's free is tomorrow, in Mr Klopp's classroom during lunch."

"I'll take it."

\----

James cautiously enters Mr Klopp's classroom at lunch the next day. He had been in there only a handful of times, and it was nowhere near he usually ate lunch. To make matters worse, it appeared that a strangely decorated office of sorts was set up in one corner of the room.

"I'm guessing you're James?" A tall, beautiful woman said, turning around in a large chair. Three rather intimidating teenaged boys sat around her.

"Uh, yeah." James wishes he had some confidence right now.

"Sit here." She taps the desk closest to her chair. "And don't mind these three."

As James comes closer to Hope, he gets a good look at the three boys sitting around her. One was bearded and angry looking, having the appearance of an alcoholic mafioso version of Leo's lab partner, Cesc Fabregas. He immediately recognized him as Diego Costa.

The next was a buff, Mohawked man of African heritage. He flashed James a not too friendly grin. The only reason why he knew his name was because the teenager got caught setting an entire urinal on fire last year, and made a name for himself. Mario Balotelli.

The third teen was tall and pale, with a childish face full of freckles. If it weren't for the near sleeves of tattoos he would not have looked intimidating. James knew Daniel Agger only vaguely, but also knew that the teenager had managed to beat the shit out of Luis once when the teen had hit on Daniel's sister.

"Why are they here?" James sits down, nervously eyeing the other teenagers.

"They're my henchmen. And they usually eat in Kloppo's room anyways." Hope's smile is flawless.

"They're not going to beat me up, right?" James still eyes the trio nervously.

"Nah. They'd rather play cards or some shit." She pauses to tie her hair back in a way that is particularly business-esque. "Now, we need to get to business."

James simply stares at the woman before him. He doesn't know what to say, and only hopes that she'll begin to talk again. She does not. The silence goes on longer.

Eventually David taps James on the arm. "You gotta tell her why you need her help." Hope pretends not to hear this and simply continues to watch James.

"Err, yes. I was told you could set me up with someone?" He half asks, confidence at an all time low.

"Yes." She seems less tense now that James has started talking. "Who is she?"

James's face pales. "Um, not a she..." He manages to mumble, but not loud enough for Hope to hear.

"Who is she? She goes to our school, right?"

"Cristiano Ronaldo?" James says, more audible this time. The sheer mention of the other teen' name gets a whistle out of the three other boys in the room.

"Oh." Hope said. "You're aiming high."

"He's single though." James counters.

"I'll see what I can do. Now, all of this, this shit costs." Hope pauses to write something down in a notebook. "But consider yourself lucky. I'm feeling particularly nice today, and your request is pretty entertaining, so I'm cutting a lot off the price."

"Price?" James asks, jaw nearly dropping.

"You don't have your own phone operators and henchmen if you work for free, now, do you?" Hope winks. "It'll be 25 dollars. Believe me, this is very cheap."

\----

Cristiano is knee-deep in a history project when his phone starts blaring. He tries to ignore it, and continue on working on his map of the Indigenous Tribes of North America, but he's already bored out of his wits trying to label all of the Midwestern states. When his phone starts ringing again, he immediately reaches over to snatch it up. The caller ID is no one other than HO₽€ $OLO.

"Cristiano." She purrs over the line.

"Hello?" He asked. He hadn't talked to Hope since his freshman year of high school, when she was just starting off her business and charged far less for doing projects.

"Cris, how are things going?" She asks, tone still honey sweet.

"They're going alri-- wait, why are you asking me?" Cris asks, eyes narrowing. Hope never does anything without reason, and certainly not phone calls.

"Ah, you know me too well."

Cristiano sighs. "Just cut to the chase."

"I met someone who would be perfect for you." The tone of her words is honeyed, and purely persuasive.

Cristiano pauses for a long while. On one hand, Hope wasn't doing this just because she met someone nice. On the other hand, she wasn't the type to set him up with any old crazy either.

"Cris? Well?"

"Oh, sorry, I was thinking about it." He manages to get out, still contemplating.

"Oh come on honey, you've been single for such a long time now." Cristiano can practically hear the smug look in her eyes, the purse of her lips, and it'd be demeaning if he didn't know that that was just how she got people to do as she said.

"Yeah, but I don't need someone to be happy."

Hope is clearly annoyed. "Yes or no, Ronaldo? I wouldn't turn down someone this good if I were you."

Cristiano decidedly blames what he says on the fact that Hope is a fantastic saleswoman and that he is a weak man. "Fine! When are you setting me up?"

\-----

Hope interrupts the last fifteen minutes of James's 8th period math class the next day. After trading some words with the teacher, she saunters over towards his desk. "Pack up your stuff, Rodriguez, it's time to go."

Slightly amazed that she had the swaying power to convince teachers to let him leave class, he followed her out of the room, slack jawed. She carries herself while walking the same way she does when she speaks; confident and with strong direction.

Outside of the classroom are Hope's usual entourage, Costa, Ballotelli and Agger. James begins to wonder how she managed to get all five of them, herself included, out of class, but his thoughts are soon interrupted by Ballotelli.

"I'm guessing we should remeet with you at your place?" He asks in a thick Italian accent.

Hope nods before taking James away from the trio of teenagers. Quickly he finds himself in her car in the senior parking lot.

"You're going on a date with Cris tomorrow." She smiles excitedly. James is unsure of how to respond.

"So what does this have to do with me being in your car?"

"Style. We can't have you going like this." Hope then proceeds to gesture to all of James before revving up her engine and leaving the parking lot.

James quickly finds himself at Hope's house (he's near certain that she broke the speed limit for most of the drive), which is exactly as large as he expected it to be. The trio of her "henchmen" quickly followed their arrival, but seemed to stay in the living room, playing smash bros, while Hope lead James upstairs.

"We're dying your hair." She says, looking at the aforementioned hair with a look of disgust.

"Hey! Neymar and I worked hard on this!" James frowns, running a hand through his still-blonde hair.

"Yeah, but it still looks like shit. And last time I checked, Neymar had frosted tips, not exactly the cutting edge of fashion either. That's why he's dating a hipster and not Cristiano Ronaldo."

James decides that there is no point in trying to argue with her. "Fine. What color?"

Hope thinks for a second. "Well, what color would you want?"

Instantly James knows his response. "Jet black!"

"WRONG. I'm not going to let you look this emo. Brown. Brown doesn't make you look like an MCR reject band member."

Dying his hair brown seems to take a lot less time than bleaching it, and Hope seems to know what she's doing more than Neymar did. Her words seem far more convincing than his best friend reading Ehow instructions over Skype. It's strange to look into the mirror and not see a mess of blonde hair, but James decides that this is most likely for the best.

"You already look better. Now, for clothing." Hope says, chipper to boss him around.

"What do you mean? I dress great!" James asks, slightly offended.

"You're wearing a fall out boy shirt."

"This is my favorite shirt."

Hope looks personally offended. "You're not wearing that on a date with Cristiano. He doesn't like scene kids, remember?"

James sighs. "Fine."

For the next hour Hope peers through an endless amount of outfits, trying to find "the one". Eventually she settles on the most hopelessly boring pair of blue jeans that James has ever seen.

"What about a shirt? Am I wearing a shirt?" James asks, more than a little frazzled.

"You're going out to eat, yes you are wearing a shirt. I just need to find one." Hope snaps before delving back into thought. Quickly her eyes brighten.

James follows Hope, who takes off for the stairs, going back down to the living room to where the three teenaged boys were. The trio snap out of their game in unison, looking at her attentively.

"Agger!" She roars. "I need your shirt."

"Miss, this is the only shirt I have on me currently!" He responds, clutching to his white button down possessively.

Hope makes James try on the shirt only fifteen minutes later, and seems pleased with the results. "Just wear this with converse or something and you'll be good to go."

James feels a little guilty wearing Daniel's shirt. "What about my checkered vans?"

Hope looks positively horrified. "Good lord no! You'll ruin the outfit!"

James sighs, but gives in. He lowers his head slightly as the walk down the stairs, Hope practically skipping in front of him. She seems more than delighted to parade him around in front of the three.

"So what do you think, boys?" Hope asks the trio of henchmen on her couch, forcefully turning James around. Daniel glares intensely, now wrapped up in Diego's hoodie.

"Could use a scarf." Ballotelli remarks, earning him a sharp look from the teens on either side of him on the couch.

"He always says that." Diego explains, choosing his words slowly. "I think it looks good. Very not emo."

"I think it'd look better if it wasn't my shirt." Daniel grumbles.

\-----

James spends the next day in a perpetual state of excitement. Not only is it Friday, but he has been gifted with the ultimate blessing of getting to go on a date with quite possibly the most attractive guy at his school, if not in the district.

He doesn't see Cristiano the whole day, but he decides that this is a good thing, as it makes his hair a surprise (he had already gotten a load of compliments from his peers alongside a enormous hug from his mother, mumbling "never do that ever again"). His confidence is on a record high.

He twitches through his entire pre-cal class, jittery and excited for his date. As soon as the last bell rings he bolts out of the classroom, makes a beeline for his locker, and begins his walk to the cafe. There is no time to stop at home, and James is not going to be late for this, good lord no.

It's no surprise that James is the first one to arrive at the cafe, small and tucked away from the rest of the booming restaurants near their school. He finds a seat and waits.

He waits and waits and waits, and he could have sworn that he had been sitting there long enough to possibly have been set up, until he realized that he had come seven minutes early and had only been waiting for eight minutes.

Cursing his nerves, he adjusts himself to get a better view of the people coming in from the door. He waits, and watches, and is nearly nodding off when he quite possibly giving himself a heart attack when he realizes that Cristiano was currently ordering a coffee.

James tries his very hardest to keep himself composed as he watches, but he's quite certain that he looks starstruck. His eyes nearly shoot out of his head when Ronaldo begins to walk towards him.

"Uh, hi." Cristiano says. HOLY FUCK James's brain says.

"Hi Cris." He responds, trying very hard not to sound like he was internally screaming.

"The cashier handed me this." Ronaldo smiles, and James smiles back until he realized that quite possibly this means Ronaldo was not at all interested.

Hi Cris!  
I told the cashier here to give this to you whenever you arrived. Your date should be the very cute brunette named James. I know you know who he is.   
HO₽€ $OLO

James tries to keep his smile less frazzled and more pleasant, but he knows he still looks fantastically concerned. "Oh. Yeah. She kept telling me about how cute she thought we'd be. I didn't have anything to do with it."

Even though he's sure Cristiano doesn't believe him for a second, the older teenager doesn't show it. "It's alright." He pauses, and seemingly gives James an approving look. "I'm liking the look."

James is ready to puke out his heart. "Thanks. I like yours-- I mean, you always look fantastic, not like I'm constantly checking you out or anything, but you look really good, like better than usual today, not to say that you don't usually look goo--"

Cris shuts him up with a look. "I get it. There's no reason to be nervous. Let's just have some fun, alright?"

James prays to all of the gods that he will not sweat profusely. He plasters on a giant smile, and wonders when he was as gay as Neymar.

Cristiano is determined to make things run smoothly though, happy to share his muffin and chat about school. James feels fantastically inadequate compared to Cris, who does not worry about calories because he has the body of a Greek god, but tries to push his thoughts aside.

"I didn't know you were into guys." Cris says, smiling pleasantly. Out of the corner of James's eye he can see Diego Costa smile and give him a thumbs up, sitting across the cafe.

"Uh, neither did I." James says, staring down into his coffee. Cris laughs, head tilted back and eyes mostly closed. He didn't realize that he was being funny.

"Fair enough. Kinda thought you were, you know? Friends with Neymar and all." James thinks about explaining how he and Neymar had been best friends since 2nd grade, but decides not to because the Brazilian does choose to surround himself with exclusively LGBT people.

"What about you?" James smiles back, sliding a hand over Cris's (Diego's thumbs up is surprisingly enheartening). Cris doesn't pay it any mind.

"Do I look straight to you?" He smiles and James chuckles back. This is the best date he may have ever gone on.

Their date comes to a close at the local park, beneath some oak tree that weren't old enough to be truly romantic, but old enough to have sizable acorns hit Cris in the head. James resists the urge to pull out Pokemon go, because he wants this to go well so badly and he's not going to take his chances.

The sun has set perhaps twenty minutes ago, street lamps now illuminating things, bouncing warm light off of russet leaves, and James is shivering under the thin button down. Winter hasn't truly come yet, but fall is on its way out, each day colder than the last.

Cristiano puts hands on both of James's arms, which have been loosely crossed not because of anger but because of how damn cold he is. The teenager wants to appreciate the fact that it's no one other than Cristiano doing this, but the older adolescent's hands are freezing, like ice blocks on the sides of his arms.

This is the part where they're supposed to romantically kiss and the credits roll, but James manages to hit Cris's nose with his own not once but twice, and the entire thing is slightly hurried and awkward. He's not proud of it per say, but that night he falls asleep with a smile on his face.

He wakes up the next day to a text from Cris and a flurry of messages from Neymar asking him how it went.

Cris <3: (9:04 AM)  
How about lunch next Wednesday?

**Author's Note:**

> Bonus points if you realize Vibe was the dude Neymar was chatting with during the olympics.


End file.
